Putin urgently sends one of his trusted men to the US after Trump’s sanctions against Russian oil

According to the chain CNNDmitriev will hold a meeting this Saturday in Miami with Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff. The head of the Russian sovereign wealth fund will discuss with the New York real estate investor how to resume dialogue after the US president seemed to have lost patience with Putin.

“This meeting of mine was planned quite a long time ago, and the American side did not cancel it, despite a series of recent unfriendly steps. We will continue the dialogue,” Dmitriev himself confirmed this Friday in statements to the agency. Reuters.

The Kremlin’s rejection of its proposal to stop fighting along the front line as a starting point to begin negotiations did not sit well with the White House. A proposal that the Ukrainian leader Volodímir Zelenski and its European allies, on the other hand, did accept.

On Thursday, Putin avoided using too strong words to criticize Trump’s new imposition of sanctions, a “hostile act” that, according to the Russian president, would have “certain consequences” on the global economy, but he sent him a couple of messages.

“This, of course, is an attempt to put pressure on Russia. But no self-respecting country or people makes decisions under pressure,” Putin declared. “I’m glad you see it that way. Perfect. We’ll see how he feels in six months,” Trump replied.

It is the first time the United States has imposed sanctions on Russia during Trump’s presidency. The Secretary of State, Marco Rubiohad commented months ago that taking this step could knock down the communication channels with Moscow.

As the months passed, however, the White House resident came to the conclusion that every time he spoke with Putin there were good words, yes, but no concrete progress towards resolving the conflict in Ukraine. “Every time I talk to Vladimir, I have good conversations and then they go nowhere,” he admitted.

The reaction of the Republican president caught the Kremlin on the wrong foot. For this reason, Putin now puts his strategy to maintain the favor of the White House in the hands of Dmitriev.

Reversing or mitigating sanctions is the main objective of this Saturday’s meeting, although, as Russian analysts explain, Farida Rustamova y Margarita Liutovathe damage of the measures will depend “on whether the main importers of Russian oil, India and China, comply with the sanctions, whether Russian companies find ways to evade them, and the price of oil.”

The Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbánwhich already saw itself as the architect of a historic agreement at the Budapest summit, announced this Friday that its Government is already looking for “ways to circumvent” US sanctions against Rosneft and Lukoil.

“Whoever wants a reduction in the prices of services must defend Hungary’s right to buy oil and gas from Russia, at the same price as the Russian price or even cheaper,” the ultra-conservative president said on Hungarian public radio this Friday.

Ace up your sleeve

Dmitriev is officially Putin’s special envoy for investment and economic cooperation and, according to the Treasury Department, one of his closest collaborators. That is why US sanctions were imposed after the start of the so-called “special military operation” in Ukraine in February 2022.

Dmitriev has directed the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) since its founding. An unorthodox sovereign fund because, instead of using the country’s wealth from fossil fuels to invest abroad, it functions more like a private equity firm, dedicated to finding foreign investors for the Kremlin.

It is not, however, the first time that Putin’s advisor has landed in the United States while the war in Ukraine continues. He did it for the first time in April to meet, precisely, Witkoff.

Born in Soviet-era Ukraine and educated at Harvard and Stanford, Dmitriev worked first as a consultant at the firm McKinsey and later as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs. That makes him the best person who knows the country and its elites among those around Putin. Furthermore, he understands Witkoff perfectly. They speak the same language. The language of business.

Since Moscow and Washington resumed direct contacts last February in Saudi Arabia, Dmitriev has offered his North American interlocutors “historic economic and investment opportunities” in Russia. A succulent offer.

Last week, without going any further, Putin’s advisor proposed building a “Trump-Putin tunnel” under the Bering Strait that would connect Alaska and the Russian Far East. Dmitriev suggested, why not, that the tycoon Elon Musk will join the company.

This Saturday he will once again have Witkoff in front of him, someone who has visited Moscow up to five times since February to talk face to face with Putin. Trump’s special envoy is the weakest link in the US administration’s chain, and Russian officials are aware of it.

“Steve didn’t know anything about Russia, he didn’t know much about Putin, not much about politics, he wasn’t very interested,” Trump himself confessed two weeks ago from the rostrum of the Israeli Knesset.

In his speech, the White House tenant said that the first meeting that Witkoff and Putin had should have lasted about 20 minutes. The appointment, however, ended up lasting 5 hours. “I said, ‘What the hell were you talking about for five hours?’” Trump recalled, laughing.

According to The Washington PostPutin proposed a territorial swap in which Ukraine would give up the Donetsk and Lugansk regions in exchange for small parts of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson. The American newspaper also reported that it had been Witkoff himself who had defended this solution within the Trymp Administration with the argument that Donbas has a Russian-speaking majority.